Near-Future RFID
Anab Jain,
Microsoft Research
7 J J Thomson Ave.
Cambridge, CB3 0FB, UK
mail@anab.in
Nicolas Marquardt
Department of Computer Science
University of Calgary
Calgary, Alberta, Canada T2N 1N4
mail@nicolaimarquardt.com
In contemporary commentaries, RFID is commonly associated
with malicious intent. Many of the positions revolve around ideas
of observation and surveillance, suggesting associations with ‘big
brother-like’ scenarios. In short, the invisible aspects of RFID are
played on and possibly exaggerated. Indeed, the popular press
appears set on projecting visions in which our privacy is clandestinely threatened, and regularly so. Whether such distopic projections come to pass (or not), what we find little of is any real effort
to consider how we might really live with RFID.
Given this backdrop, we have been involved in work speculating
on near-term futures with RFID. Our focus has been on how the
technology might interleave with daily life, not as something innately problematic, but in seemingly routine ways. This work has
close ties to a selection of exploratory investigations including
speculative proposals from the sci-fi writer Bruce Sterling [5].
Sterling describes a pragmatic yet alternative future through the
notion of the ‘spime’ that enables a new, massively interconnected
world of things and people. Similarly, more radical inquiries have
drawn further attention to RFID’s capacity to support networks of
people and things. Various projects have explored, for example,
implanting RFID chips into the body [6,7].
In this submission, we present a strategy adopted to build on research and critical investigations like the above. We present a
selection of conceptual objects and a future scenario based around
them. In doing so, we aim to draw on what has been loosely
termed critical design [see 8], a perspective that employs design to
provoke thought around the possibilities of certain technologies,
and open spaces for debate and reflection.
Speculative Scenario
Our speculative scenario envisages a new RFID-enriched landscape that has transformed the ways we interact with digital media. RFID tagging and sensing has been extended to the body as
tags and sensors allow individuals to build associations with digital content in the physical world. This tagging system, making
visible the RFID infrastructure, allows people to instrument their
environments for aesthetic as well as practical reasons. It thus
comes to be used as a performative resource as people manipulate,
extend and constantly update their digital selves. Ideas of privacy
are altered dramatically as personal information once invisible is
made visible and appropriated into a new aesthetic sensibility.
Mobile Play: In one vision we imagine RFID being incorporated
into established online, social networking practices. Here, though,
physical tags and readers take on prominence (Fig. 1).
Figure 1. Brooch and earring with visible RFID tags as integral element.
Mobile phone discovers content from jewelry.
Using the commonplace Mobile Reader, things are tagged to exploit people’s access to a burgeoning layer of digital information.
From small familiar RFID antenna on bespoke jewelry to large-
Alex Taylor
Microsoft Research
7 J J Thomson Ave.
Cambridge, CB3 0FB, UK
ast@microsoft.com
scale experimental wallpapers, invisible tags become visible and
contribute to new aesthetics. Tagged accessories are worn to manage different levels of intimacy, content and broadcast range. Users associate these accessories with digital content using an online
service, and use their Mobile Readers to scan the environment for
content published by others.
Body Ranger: The Body Ranger (Fig. 2) is a reader with detachable headphones, designed to sense RF emissions over long distances. Sounds associated with tags are heard using head-phones
so that a user can continuously hear changing audio content as
he/she moves through physical space. Any visual content is made
visible by pointing the device in the direction of a RFID tag.
Figure 2. Body Ranger
and ‘users’ with tattoolike antennas to
transmit information.
In our near-future scenario, the Body Ranger has been taken up by
a community that openly demonstrates their aesthetic. The readers
are personalized to resemble provocative objects. The community
have also designed their own tags. The large antennae used to
‘broadcast’ over distances have become heavily ornamental. For
example, community members adorn themselves with elaborate
tattoo-like antennas attached to RFID chips worn on the body.
Using the Body Ranger, digital content constitutes a traversable
geography interleaving features of the physical and audio-visual.
Head Guard: Head Guard consists of a long-range RFID reader
attached to a headset (Fig. 3). In its dormant state, light is emitted
in the presence of a tag. Heard Guard is activated when worn. It
buzzes and vibrates when a tagged person or object approaches.
Captured data can be fed into a computer and visualized in different ways. Because of the technical limitations of long-range readers, however, the visualizations display trends or patterns of RFID.
Figure 3. The Head Guard.
In our scenario, Head Guard has been built by someone who
remains fearful and suspicious of the tracking nature of RFID
technology. As a consequence he obsesses over RFID ‘emissions’,
tracking them himself in search of individual or patterns of tag
movement. He spends his days scanning his neighborhood, usually
from his window as seen in the opposite page, and rendering the
generated data in different ways.
References
1. Dunne, A. Hertzian Tales. MIT Press, MA, 2006.
2. Graafstra, A. RFID Toys: Cool Projects for Home, Office, and
Entertainment. John Wiley & Sons, NY, 2006.
3. Sterling, B. Shaping Things. The MIT Press, MA, 2005.
4. Trainor, Meghan. http://meghantrainor.com.